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Chicken kebab and Aleppo mortadella

For the January-February 2013 Daring Cooks’ Challenge, Carol, one of our talented non-blogging members and Jenni, one of our talented bloggers who writes The Gingered Whisk, have challenged us to make homemade sausage and/or cured, dried meats in celebration of the release of the book Salumi: The Craft of Italian Dry Curing by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn! We were given two months for this challenge and the opportunity to make delicious Salumi in our own kitchens!

Sausages evolved as a way to preserve meat in order to make it last longer – smoking, curing in salt, and drying it in. Most food cultures offer some form of sausage making, and the climate in each area had an effect on how a culture prepared its sausage – to eat it fresh, hang to dry or smoke it. Typically when you think of sausage you think of European countries – Kielbasa from Poland, Bangers from England (which get their name from their tight casing which often breaks during cooking, Haggis from Scotland etc., but other countries have forms of sausages, too. Korea has Sundae, Isan sausages from Thailand. There are literally hundreds of different varieties of sausages.

Sausages can be made from just about anything and they do not necessarily have to be stuffed either. Sausages can be combinations of vegetables, rice, meat or eggs . They can be patties, or stuffed into casings, natural or synthetic, or wrapped in leaves, wrappers or dough. Indeed, you can cure whole muscles and slice as you would sausage.

There are three basic types of sausage – dry (which have been hung to dry and cure), semi-dry (which have been cured via smoking) and fresh (which are cooked and then eaten immediately).

Fresh sausage is ground meat or vegetables that have been combined with seasonings and are meant to be cooked. Generally speaking, you need to fry, sauté, grill, poach or bake this sausage until it reaches an internal temperature of about 155°F/68°C for pork and 165°F/73°C for chicken or turkey. Sausages also benefit from a rest period like meat, so remove your sausage when the internal temperature is about 5 degrees lower than you want it to be. There is a tendency to overcook sausage, i.e. over 200°F/93°C until the interior is grainy and dry – but what you are looking for is a moist, tender interior.

When this challenge was announced I was certain I was going to sit this one out. Most of the recipes provided either contained pork or required long curing times and a controlled environment that I could not maintain at home. Add the fact that I have two kids at home and having meat hanging around in a little apartment did not seem like a good idea at all. After some thinking I decided to make two middle eastern recipes that would fall in the category of fresh sausage.

Mortadella Halabiye, or Aleppan Mortadella. Not to be confused with the popular Italian cured meat, Aleppan Mortadella is much smaller in size, made with lamb or beef or a combination of both and is cooked in stock or poached, not cured. Aleppan Mortadella is usually served as a starter as part of a spread of mezze along side hummus and muhammara, it can also be used as a sandwich filling. Either way it is a tantalizing mix of meat and spice that is sure to capture your senses

Aleppo Mortadella

This recipe makes 1 log

400g lean beef

60 grams ice cubes

1/2 cup bread crumbs

1 egg

1 tablespoon allspice, ground

1/4 teaspoon ground coriander

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

6-7 pitted green olives or 1/4 cup unsalted toasted pistachios

Poaching liquid

enough water to submerge the mortadella

1 cup apple cider vinegar

2 bay leaves

2 cloves garlic

5-7 all spice berries

1 teaspoon dried oregano (if you have fresh use 2-3 stems)

1 teaspoon dried basil (if you have fresh use 3-4 leaves)

1 teaspoon dried parsley(if you have fresh use 3-4 stems)

Place the meat and ice into your food processor and use the blade attachment to grind the meat into a creamy consistency. You want the meat to be smooth, almost spreadable. You can do this in a food grinder by grinding the meat 3 times.

Add the egg, bread crumbs, spices and salt and blend until completely incorporated

To form the mortadella:

Place a piece of cling film on the table,flatten the meat mixture into a rectangle.Sprinkle with pistachios or olives.

Fold closed with the help of the cling film, and form into a smooth log. Use ice water to smooth the meat mixture if you feel that it is a bit sticky.

completely enclose the meat with the cling film and twist the edges.

Roll the log back and forth a few times to help it take shape

Refrigerate until ready to cook in the stock (can be done a day in advance).

Prepare the poaching liquid by adding all the ingredients to a pot and bringing the water to a boil

Wrap the mortadella in foil and twist the edges

Add the mortadella (make sure it is completely submerged by the liquid)and cook over medium heat for 45 minutes or until the internal temperature is 73 C.

Take the mortadella out of the water, allow it to drain any leftover water then allow it to cool completely

Wrap with cling film and refrigerate

How to serve mortadella

Mortadella is usually served as part of the mezze along side dishes like hummus and muhammara.

You can serve it by slicing it into rounds as part of a cold meat platter

you can serve it as an appetizer topped with hummus and tomato cubes with a drizzle of lemon juice

You can cook it in a little butter and serve it as mini sandwiches with lettuce ketchup and mustard

You can also use the mortadella as part of pizza topping

You can chop it up and add it to your omlette

Chicken sausage كباب الدجاج

Chicken sausage is one of my go to dishes when I don’t have time. Just pulse everything together, form into sausages or patties, cook and serve. Quick, easy and satisfying. You can play around with the seasoning and adapt it to your liking.

600 g chicken breasts

1 medium onion chopped

1-2 cloves of garlic

1 inch of ginger peeled and grated

1 apple peeled and grated

1/2 cup parsley

1/4 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon curry

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon all spice

Place the chicken in your food and pulse using the blade until it is smooth

Add the remaining ingredients and pulse continuously until the mix is smooth

Shape into logs or sausage shape and smooth by wetting your fingertips in cold water

Heat a little oil in a pan and cook the sausages until they are browned on all the sides or place in a baking tray and place in the oven at 200 C until they are no longer pink in the center or the internal temperature is 73 C

Wow! I am one of the people who rarely buys storebought sausages for the usual reasons: fats, salt, nitrites/nitrates etc et al. But you have given two beautiful and very doable recipes both of which I will most certainly make. Absolutely love the poached mortadella: it ticks all the boxes for me, but the lighter chicken sausages also have huge appeal! Never mind parties, I would make either for own breakfast, lunch or supper 🙂 ! [Hope your eyes are improving . . . ]

Sawson……….you continue to amaze me. Your sausages turned out so wonderful. I grew up on a farm and we made all our own food, including all the meats and sausages. I am so impressed that anyone would bother or even knows how to prepare sausage anymore. I love your mortadella recipe and will be making that soon. Thank you again for sharing your wonderful talent. Your photographs continue to stun me. Ciao!

Wonderful post. Making sausage is very satisfying. I will have to pick up that book. I make a pork breakfast sausage that is spicy, sweet and smoky. I am going to make some Gyros loaf to roast over a fire this spring. I found a great recipe and cannot wait to try it.

Beautiful results. I am very interested by the olive (Aleppan mortadella sausage). You totally mastered this challenge!
We have a long/ holiday weekend this weekend, so I hope to be able to make some stuffed challenges during the holiday.

Oh, Sawsan, I loved, loved, loved this post. I have never made anything like the Aleppo Mortadella (Chicken Sausages, yes, but maybe not as delicious-looking as these). I must try this recipe. I loved the background as well. Thank you so much for sharing.

I have never made sausages before, and though my kids like it a lot, I hesitate in buying them from the store. These sausages look so tempting that I have a mind to give them a try. Lovely post Sawsan!!

What an interesting post, I too would have an issue with the raw meat hanging around, but I do have a smoker so that would work. I really like the presentation, particularly with the dip on top as the poached mortadella doesn’t have the loveliest colour when cooked. It’s really cool that the chicken sausage didn’t need a casing and yet it stayed together very well. You really pulled this post together, considering you had considered not participating. Nicely done.

This looks so yummy, Sawsan. I did sit this one out, mainly due to the inconvenience of hanging meat in my house. But I didn’t have the patience to look up a more user friendly recipe like this one :)) Great job, friend on a challenge superbly executed!

Great job on the challenge! I decided to sit this one out 🙂 I love both your choices and the mortadella came out beautifully. I thought about doing an Indian cured meat we have but like you I didn’t want meat hanging outside let alone inside!

You are a brave soul Sawsan. I would have totally sat this one out but you are such a trooper and you obviously you like a challenge. Your mortadella looks delicious. I love all the ways you showed us how to serve it.

Hi Sawsan – I’m really surprised… the idea of preparing/cooking such a thing at home (without specialised equipment or facilities) never crossed my mind at all, but what a fantastic idea! I love the sound of the mortadella especially. It looks sooo good dotted with those olives there. Thanks so much for the inspiration – I’m definitely going to give this a try at some point!

WOW! I love both of these sausages but I am especially partial to the mortadella! I don’t believe I’ve ever had a sausage like that and it looks like something that we would LOVE in this house! What a beautiful and informative post Sawson! Glad to see your eyesight is better! I totally forgot about the challenge. UGH! Now that I’ve seen your delicious sausages, I’m going to need to jump on it. I did have a plan. 🙂

Good job! I rarely make fresh sausage, and I don’t know why not – it’s so flavorful, and I can spice it exactly as I wish. I particularly like your chicken sausage – great new way to eat chicken. Fun post, good recipes – thanks.

I, too, think I would have passed on this challenge, Sawsan. I make my family’s sausage and that is enough for me. Still, I have to admit, I’m intrigued by your Aleppo mortadella and I’d love to have a taste of it and your chicken sausage. If either are anything like your previous dishes, both must be delicious.

Wonderful challenge completed, Sawsan! I opted out from the challenge for the same reason too- I just couldnt find any vegetarian casing, and the whole sausage making is so daunting! I would love to try out you rmortadella, over here, I usually buy the turkish salami, but I think yours outwin them in taste anytime!

Both the sausages are interesting combinations of flavours or techniques that I’ve not tried before. The poached mortadella is especially unique as I’ve never poached something in that fashion before and I’ve not seen nuts used in a sausage previously. I make a type of ground chicken patty which is very tasty but again, the addition of the parsley, apples and the spice combination is very different from my experience. I think I’d enjoy tasting both very much.

You have so much patience to try the most difficult recipes but somehow when you explain it it seems so easy. Your Aleppo mortadella is beautiful and I’d love to have a taste of it and your chicken sausage as well. Take care, BAM

Wow, what an informative post Sawsan! I must admit that I thought of the Italian mortadella when I first saw your headline — but I can see how different your version is. I love the flavour combination and so I know it would be worth the effort. CCU is right, this looks like charcutterie heaven!

[…] to know Jenni through the daring kitchen.She hosted a few amazing challenges like povitica and homemade sausages. She stood out as one of those people who are extra nice and helpful. She always has something […]